Meetings

B. Elaboration of Significant Episode

What a day, what a day, what a day. Today wasn't bad, just busy. Today was very long because I had a 45 meeting after school today. I had to drop my carpool off at the mall on my way to my meeting at the administration building. The girls didn't want to have to just wait in the car for so long. Our meeting was for all the special education teachers to go over ISTEP and new reevaluation paperwork procedures. The meeting was just very long and very confusing. I am not used to the Kokomo paperwork and I just didn't really know what was going on. What I could gather the paperwork we were given was even more paperwork to be put in with the re-evaluation. All the teachers were griping because it already takes so long to do IEP's and standard paperwork, let alone with more paperwork. I guess that is the life of the special educator though.

C. Analysis of Episode
It was hard to sit in the meeting, especially while the other girls were shopping. I am not one that does well with staying late at school and doing my work. I am much more of a morning person and by afternoon I just shut down. I need a break after school to just relax and take a breath of air. I need to put on comfy clothes and put my feet up, then do my work after I had a bit of recuperation time. It was good for me to be in the meeting. It is good to get a feel for different school districts and their written procedures. It is good to be able to document correctly for current progress, assessment, and retesting.

First grade fun:
This week in our first grade reading whole group (of 3), we are focusing on the first 2 brothers in the LiPS program: P/B Lip Poppers. We have been doing different activities each day to help reinforce how to make the letters and which is noisy and quiet (voice/unvoiced.) Yesterday I used the color changing markers with note cards. I used the white “magic” marker to write p/b on the note cards. When the students used a regular colored marker the Magic color showed the hidden letters. My guys were so excited with the magically appearing letters. Today I used white crayon to write our 2 letters. The boys used water colors to paint the paper. Magically our letters appeared; the boys loved the hands on activity. Then we got to use the paint brushes to try and make our own letters. They boys did very well with this activity. After that we washed our hands and then I pulled out my surprise jar of…Peanut Butter. We identified our Lip Poppers on the label. Each boy got a plop of peanut butter on a plate. They got to squish it around and make the letters p/b. I was very surprised that they kept making their letters the right way!!! They finally got to eat the peanut butter and we got to laugh afterwards when their little faces were covered with it. We cleaned up and then got ready for seat work and individual reading time. I love doing fun hands-on activities. I think my teacher was a little skeptical, but hopefully this hand-on approach will give the students a better way to remember their letters versus just seeing them on filmstrip or white paper.


Memorable Moment of the day:
This afternoon Mrs. M was teaching math to my first graders (it was my planning time). The boys were a little more restless after their reading lesson. One of them had to take away 2 out of his three cars. Then our other sweet little one was not following directions. Mrs. M made him take away one of their cards (this makes them not get their piece of candy for the day.) He started bawling on the way back to the table. Mrs. M does not put up with crying and told him that first graders should not cry. This only made him feel worse and he cried even more. Sobbing he said, “I’m going to get a spanking when I get home for flipping a card.” Mrs. M explained that the first card is just a warning and no note will be sent home; so he was not in trouble. He still said, “But, I’m still going to get a spanking.” Mrs. M asked him how his mom was going to find out because she (Mrs. M) was not sending any note home. Our student cried out, “Because I’m going to tell her.” (Sobbing.) I guess you just had to be there, but it was hilarious. Mrs. M and I had to chuckle to the side. He was getting all worked up. He finally calmed down. After school his gen ed teacher asked why he was upset. Maybe tomorrow our little one will follow the rules.